gopnik on play in the smithsonian mag

We found children who were better at pretending could reason better about counterfactuals—they were better at thinking about different possibilities. And thinking about possibilities plays a crucial role in the latest understanding about how children learn. The idea is that children at play are like pint-sized scientists testing theories. They imagine ways the world could work and predict the pattern of data that would follow if their theories were true, and then compare that pattern with the pattern they actually see. Even toddlers turn out to be smarter than we would have thought if we ask them the right questions in the right way.  

Play is under pressure right now, as parents and policymakers try to make preschools more like schools. But pretend play is not only important for kids; it’s a crucial part of what makes all humans so smart.

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Imaginations More Active Despite Less Play Time, Study Shows

Play as Safety Valve

However, while imagination can be developed via other methods, children’s emotional development may be taking a bigger hit from limits on playtime, the Case Western researchers found.

Children in the study showed no change in positive emotions and enjoyment during the play sessions, but over the years they became much less likely to show negative emotion during play. That might seem like a benefit—children are becoming happier in their play—but Ms. Russ finds it troubling that children are less likely to use play as a safety valve for aggression, depression and other bad feelings.

“This may be where the lack of time to play may be starting to hurt,” Ms. Russ said. “Play is safe; it’s pretend, and if they express negative emotions, it’s OK. Children use play to process negative emotion, and if they don’t have as much time to play, they don’t have many other places where they can do it. So as a clinical psychologist, that finding concerns me.”

John J. Ratey, a clinical associate professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School in Cambridge, Mass., called play “vital, not only for students’ happiness but their ability to take in new information and learn about failure.”

-EdWeek